Mido Powerwind
Frank Sinatra wins his first Grammy AwardThe 1959 Mido Powerwind 1000 ft. diver watch ref. 5907 is the pinnacle of all the Mido’s!
The multi-colored scales represent decompression times rates in feet and the polished, graduated bi-directional bezel marks the decompression times.
In 1934, Mido introduced Multifort, a completely revolutionary watch at that time: it was shock-proof and water resistant, besides being antimagnetic. The Multifort was also the first Mido model to have a self-winding movement and this was an achievement in the history of the company. In the same year, Mido introduced watches with unbreakable strings, as well as a new system for waterproof watches. It consisted of using cork to seal the crown: the stem of the crown passes through a tiny cork gasket compressed in a housing, which ensures a seal even if the crown is not fully pushed-in. Franz Linder, Director of Mido, compares this to a bottle of wine that remains sealed even if the cork is half-drawn.
The first ever specialized diving watches were the Panerai, used by the Italian frogmen in the Second World War. Actually they were Rolex 3646s with special dials made by Panerai.
Right after WWII, two French combat diving corps started to search for a military grade diving watch, big and easy to read underwater, hermetically sealed and capable to absorb shocks this helped Blancpain to develop the legendary Fifty Fathoms introduced in 1953. The transformation of the simple water resistant watch to the tool diver watch happened at that exact point. The next year Rolex launched perhaps the most famous diver watch of them all, the Rolex Submariner; from that point most of the Swiss companies started to shift their attention towards the sea, trying to produce reliable underwater-capable wristwatches.